Gates outlines aggressive agenda for US imperialism in Asia
By Joseph Santolan
7 June 2011
In a speech given in Singapore on June 4, US Defense Secretary Robert Gates laid out plans for American military expansion in the Asian region and for heightened confrontation with China. His remarks, delivered at the 10th International Institute for Security Studies (IISS) Asia Security Summit, came amid rapidly rising tensions between China and other claimants to the South China Sea.
The 10th IISS Asia Security Summit, known as the Shangri-La dialogue, took place from June 3 to 5. Previous years have seen military and diplomatic figures speaking on key regional issues at plenary sessions. Gates has attended the past five years and used his address last year to unequivocally warn China that “intimidation” of American oil corporations companies operating in the South China Sea would not be tolerated. This year the Chinese Defense Minister attended for the first time, and delivered an address to the summit as well.
Regional tensions have mounted substantially since Gates’s speech last year, particularly over the disputed waters of the South China Sea. The waters are a vital shipping lane and the seabed contains large oil and gas deposits. The South China Sea is claimed in whole or in part by China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Malaysia, Brunei and the Philippines. The intensifying regional friction reflects the deepening confrontation between the US, whose global economic position has been in steady decline, and China.
The past two weeks saw two confrontations. On May 26, Vietnam accused China of cutting the cables being laid by an oil exploration vessel belonging to the state-owned corporation PetroVietnam, which was conducting pre-drilling surveys on behalf of ExxonMobil and the Canadian oil company Talisman Energy.
On May 31, the Philippines claimed that China had begun construction of new military facilities on unoccupied islands in the Spratly Island chain. It summoned the Chinese ambassador and denounced the construction as a “clear violation” of the 2002 ASEAN-China Declaration of Conduct in the South China Sea, which is an agreement for the shared use of disputed waters.
Gates was the first plenary speaker at the security summit. His speech was a shot fired across the bows of China and call to regional allies to oppose Chinese expansion in the region. It laid out the agenda for an expanded US military presence in the Asia-Pacific region and warned sharply against underestimating the US military commitment to the region.
Gates opened by pointing to what he said was “foremost in everyone’s mind”—the declining economic power of the US and its stretched military resources. The credibility of US global commitments was being questioned, he said. “No doubt, fighting two protracted and costly wars in Iraq and Afghanistan has strained the US military’s ground forces, and worn out the patience and appetite of the American people for similar interventions in the future. On the domestic front, the United States is emerging slowly from a serious recession with huge budget deficits and growing debt that is putting new scrutiny and downward pressure on the US defense budget.”
Gates made clear that none of this—including mounting opposition from the American public—would deter Washington. We should expect to see, he said, a “significant growth in the breadth and intensity of US engagement in Asia.” This increased military deployment would establish a “defense posture across the Asia Pacific that is more geographically distributed, operationally resilient, and politically sustainable. A posture that maintains our presence in Northeast Asia while enhancing our presence in Southeast Asia and into the Indian Ocean.”
To this end, Gates stated, the US had deployed its newly-constructed Littoral Combat Ships to Singapore, from where to guard the vital strategic Straits of Malacca. “In the coming years,” he stated, “the US military is going to be increasing its port calls, naval engagements, and multilateral training efforts with multiple countries throughout the region.”
The US has a vital national interest, Gates asserted, in freedom of navigation. While the American military was already stretched thin by two ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, it would engage in “key modernization programs [which] would address one of the principal security challenges we see growing over the horizon: The prospect that new and disruptive technologies and weapons could be employed to deny US forces access to key sea routes and lines of communication.” This vow was obviously directed at Beijing. US diplomats and military officials have repeatedly leveled the charge against China that it is seeking to control the flow of commerce and sea traffic in the South China Sea.
Liang Guanglie, the Chinese defense minister, gave a stiff but deliberately conciliatory address. He studiously avoided mention of mounting tensions in the region, never mentioned Taiwan or the recent events with Vietnam and the Philippines. Only at the conclusion to his question and answer session, when repeatedly pressed by a reporter from the American Foreign Policy journal, did he respond to Gates’s claims with a certain amount of pique, saying “freedom of navigation has never been impeded, has never been a problem, and the situation in the South China Sea remains stable.”
Gates’s words, on the other hand, were sharply confrontational throughout. He had concluded his comments by declaring “history’s dustbin is littered with dictators and aggressors who underestimated America’s resilience, will and underlying power.” This was a threat, not even thinly disguised, to China.
During an interview prior to the summit, Gates stated: “The Chinese have learned a powerful lesson from the Soviet experience, and they do not intend to try and compete with us across the full range of military capabilities. But I think they are intending to build capabilities that give them a considerable freedom of action in Asia, and the opportunity to extend their influence.” As his speech made clear, the US intends to respond no less aggressively to China than it did to the Soviet Union.
Gates’s speech was hailed by the Wall Street Journal, in an opinion piece on June 6, which excitedly trumpeted the fact that “Beijing is uncomfortably confronting the reality that almost all regional countries choose not only to hedge with America, but are actively maneuvering to perpetuate American strategic dominance in Asia.”
As other summit speeches demonstrated, however, more than active maneuvering is taking place. Encouraged by US support, the Vietnamese and Philippine defense ministers spoke sharply and pointedly about recent events in the South China Sea.
Vietnamese Defense Minister General Phung Quang Thanh explicitly cited the May 26 confrontation between Chinese and Vietnamese ships and stated: “We truly expect no repetition of similar incidents.” China’s claim to the almost all of the South China Sea had no basis in international law, Thanh insisted. Deputy defence minister Nguyen Chi Vinh stated in an interview: “If any party concerned wishes to escalate, Vietnam will act to defend its sovereignty. We will not sit there and watch.”
The words of Philippine Defense Secretary General Voltaire Gazmin were even stronger. The actions of China had caused the Philippines “worry and concern,” he declared. Private business firms conducting resource exploration, i.e., oil drilling, were threatened. Gazmin denounced the construction of structures on the disputed islands. What he did not mention was that Philippine President Aquino announced just three months ago, after US prodding, that he would begin construction of military installations on precisely these disputed islands. The Chinese construction has simply pre-empted what the Philippines was preparing to do.
Gazmin stressed repeatedly that the Philippine response involved “collaboration with other armed forces to ensure the safety of navigation and peace.” The Philippines would pursue “robust ties with other forces” to ensure that it remained free from “forces that would disturb its peace.” If the veiled language of “forces” was unclear, an interview after the speech was explicit. US navy ships were needed in the region, he stated, to make it more difficult for China to misbehave. “When the cat is away the mice will play,” he said. He urged the US “to exercise its persuasive power over the South China Sea.”
Vietnam, the Philippines and other ASEAN members are playing a dangerous balancing game: while economically dependent on China, which is for many their largest trading partner, they are encouraging a greater US military presence as a means of asserting their own interests against Beijing. The result of the Obama administration’s aggressive intervention into South East Asia is a marked rise of regional tensions and the potential for military confrontations and clashes.

Bangladesh: U.S. And NATO Forge New Military Partnership In South Asia [ 70331 ] -
Rick Rozoff

Stop NATO - September 29, 2010

The Foreign Ministry of Bangladesh disclosed on September 26 that the United States had requested combat troops for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s military command in Afghanistan.

The effort to recruit Bangladeshi soldiers for the nine-year-old war was made in an overture by U.S. Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke to Bangladesh’s Foreign Minister Dipu Moni in New York City, presumably on the sidelines of or following last week’s United Nations General Assembly session.

A statement issued by the government of Bangladesh said that Holbrooke "sought for any kind of help like deploying combat troops, providing economic and development assistance or giving training among the law enforcement agencies." [1]

Should the government of Bangladesh accede to the American request, it would become the 48th official Troop Contributing Nation for NATO’s International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) and the seventh Asia-Pacific nation to provide troops to the North Atlantic military alliance for its war in South Asia, one which has further advanced across Afghanistan’s eastern border into Pakistan with marked ferocity during the past five days. NATO will have gained another major ally in the building of its Asian complement using the Afghan-Pakistani war theater as the grounds for integrating the armed forces of countries on the other side of the world from the North Atlantic for what is expanding into a global U.S.-led military network.

Bangladesh’s combat forces would join military units from Malaysia, Mongolia, Singapore, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand among Asia-Pacific countries, with a report that a 275-troop marine contingent from Tonga is also to arrive in Afghanistan soon. Japan has personnel assigned to NATO’s Provincial Reconstruction Teams in the country and in the past has supplied the U.S. with naval assistance for the war effort.

The inclusion of Bangladesh into the ranks of NATO’s ISAF, however, would constitute a milestone in two key ways. It would be the only country in South Asia with troops in the war zone aside from the two nations in which the expanding conflict is being fought: Afghanistan and Pakistan. And Bangladesh would be the second most populous state contributing to NATO’s military campaign, only surpassed by the U.S., as it has the seventh largest population in the world at 160 million.

The war in Afghanistan has provided the Pentagon and NATO the groundwork for working with the militaries of scores of nations under real world and real time combat conditions. Every European country except Belarus, Cyprus, Malta, Moldova, Russia and Serbia has deployed troops to Afghanistan under NATO command, as have the nations of the South Caucasus: Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia. The United Arab Emirates is the first Persian Gulf state to do so.

Though not yet official contributing nations, several other countries have personnel in Afghanistan or on the way, including Bahrain, Colombia, Egypt and Japan. Over a quarter of the world’s nations have supplied military contingents for the North Atlantic bloc’s war in Afghanistan.

In the past year both the U.S. and NATO have intensified activities aimed at integrating Bangladesh into the West’s military nexus, both in preparation for the deployment of its troops to Afghanistan and for solidifying what for the past decade has been referred to as Asian NATO.

This May 12 a roundtable meeting was held in the capital of Bangladesh entitled "The Role of NATO in the New Security Order" with the participation of several "experts, military personnel and former government officials from the region." [2] The title of the event suggests it was conducted in the context of last year’s discussions of the new NATO Strategic Concept held in several European and North American nations. The Indian subcontinent is far-removed from the North Atlantic Alliance’s point of origin, but the new doctrine to be adopted this November at NATO’s summit in Portugal will institutionalize the bloc’s expansion into an international military and – to use its own term – security organization.

The keynote address was delivered by former Norwegian defense minister Anders Christian Sjaastad and the roundtable as a whole "discuss[ed] the present and possible role of NATO in [the] new security order…."

A local newspaper account of the meeting reported that "Speakers at a roundtable here…said the greatest evolution taken place in NATO over the past 20 years was its transition from a static, defensive force to a force ready to take on security missions well beyond its traditional Trans-Atlantic borders."

"Since the last revision of the strategic concept, NATO forces have undertaken missions in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo, counter-piracy missions in the Gulf of Aden, counter-terrorism missions in the Mediterranean Sea, training missions in Iraq, and active military operations in Afghanistan." (NATO’s bombing campaign in and deployment of 60,000 troops to Bosnia in 1994-1995 predated the current Strategic Concept adopted in 1999.)

NATO has in fact expanded into a global military force, the first in history, and in the words of the former Norwegian defense chief, "It was the attacks of September 11 in 2001 and the Afghanistan campaign that turned what had been theoretical analysis into reality." [3]

"The event made NATO 'go global.’" [4]

Whether fully cognizant of it at the time or not, Sjaastad spoke volumes regarding NATO’s 21st century plans in stating that Asia "is where the action is nowadays. Europe, in comparison, is rather dull….All the global conflicts originated from this part of the world." Whether regarding the recent or remote past, his claim that all global conflicts originated from Asia is an absurd contention, but is indicative of NATO’s determination to pacify and subjugate "unruly" parts of the non-Euro-Atlantic world.

The opening remarks were made by retired Major General ANM Muniruzzaman, the founder and president of the Bangladesh Institute of Peace and Security Studies which sponsored the event, who "spoke of the eastward expansion of NATO, saying that the institution has undergone a sea change. The New NATO had a fresh strategic concept and was expanding beyond its original Eurocentric perimeters." That is, Europe has been united under NATO control and now it is time to move on Asia.

Someone identified as retired Major General Roomi was in the audience and commented from the floor:

"NATO instead of doing policing is protecting its own security and posing a threat to others. And why are you in Afghanistan? It is not just because of Al Qaeda and the Taliban. It is also because of the oil in the region. You want to 'tame’ Pakistan, Iran. All this has other motives. NATO only comes with its own interests at heart." [5] The former general evidently remembered which side the U.S. and its NATO allies were on during his country’s 1971 war of independence.

Since late last year the Pentagon has demonstrably increased efforts to pull the armed forces of Bangladesh into its geopolitical orbit.

In early November three U.S. military commanders visited Bangladesh. Theirs were names to conjure with: Lieutenant General Benjamin Mixon, Commanding General of United States Army Pacific and former commander of the Multi-National Division North in Iraq. Vice Admiral John Bird, commander of the U.S. Seventh Fleet, the largest forward-deployed fleet in the world. U.S. Marine Corps Major General Randolph Alles, Director for Strategic Planning and Policy at the U.S. Pacific Command, the largest overseas military command in the world.

The three made "separate trips, but the goal of each of the visits [was] to strengthen bilateral security cooperation between the two countries." They met with the chiefs of the host country’s army and navy as well as senior government officials. Beforehand the U.S. embassy in Dhaka announced that "Their discussions will focus on interoperability, readiness in the region, security-force assistance, and bilateral approaches to maintaining regional stability." [6]

Also in early November the U.S. led the first of four Tiger Shark military exercises held in the nation. The latest, Tiger Shark-4, ended on September 26.

At the close of the first, U.S. Ambassador James F. Moriarty attended a graduation ceremony for 59 navy commandos at the Bangladesh Navy Special Warfare and Diving Salvage Centre at the BNS (Bangladesh Naval Ship) Issa Khan Naval Base in Chittagong. "The commandos received specialised training during the US-Bangladesh 'Tiger Shark’ exercise" that ended on November 13.

According to the American envoy, "The United States Government will continue to assist the Government of Bangladesh in developing this professional, elite force.

"The training demonstrates the United States Government’s commitment to Bangladesh and to regional security by promoting military-to-military relationships throughout Asia and the Pacific." [7]

Tiger Shark-2 was held this May and U.S. army personnel "provided highly sophisticated training to the Bangladesh Army on counter terrorism, marksmanship and urban operations." Ambassador Moriarty "reaffirmed the US government’s support to the Bangladesh government’s efforts to establish a more capable military." [8]

Tiger Shark-3 occurred the next month and this time was multi-service on the Bangladeshi side, with army, navy, air force and coast guard units training with the U.S. to "enhance interoperability between the militaries of the two countries" in exercises that included "combat diving, infiltration and ex-filtration techniques, rappelling, helicopters operations, vessel boarding search and seizure, small boat maintenance and repair, maritime navigation, small unit tactics and small boat handling and tactics." [9]

Tiger Shark-4 was held from September 19-26 with 500 Bangladesh army, air force and navy personnel along with helicopters and ships and 350 U.S. troops and aircraft, helicopters and ships. For the first time the exercises provided comprehensive "joint military exposure between Bangladesh and the USA," and "a Commodore from the Bangladesh side and a Rear Admiral from the US side" led their respective nation’s forces. [10]

As the largest of the four Tiger Shark exercises was underway, 65 American airmen and two C-130 Hercules military transport aircraft arrived in Bangladesh for the three-day Cope South 2010 exercise to practice "aircraft generation and recovery, low-level navigation, tactical airdrop, and air-land missions; and conducting subject-matter expert exchanges in the operations, maintenance and rigging disciplines" [11] for regional disasters. In the words of U.S. 36th Airlift Squadron commander Lieutenant Colonel Tim Rapp, "The techniques our two nations share and the relationships we build will significantly ease planning and execution of any future combined efforts." [12]

Washington’s efforts to recruit Bangladesh into an Asia-Pacific military alliance that includes all but a small handful of nations in the region complements its building a new army and upgrading strategic air bases in Afghanistan. Its penetration of Pakistan’s armed forces. Its further forging of a strategic military alliance with India. [13]

After employing NATO to subjugate Europe, launching U.S. Africa Command to gain military dominance over the 54-nation continent, and occupying and pacifying most of the Middle East, the Pentagon is concentrating on Asia and increasingly on South Asia.

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Pakistan’s government filed an official protest with the United States today following a cross-border attack by NATO warplanes from Afghanistan against a military post in Mohmand Agency.

Pakistan said two jets had crossed the border into Pakistani airspace and that they had dropped six bombs on the military post, which lies just a mile and a half from the border with Afghanistan. No deaths were reported.

The Foreign Ministry termed the attack a "serious concern" and called for the US to assist in a "joint inquiry" of how the attack happened. NATO has yet to comment on the attack.

The attack comes just a day after Afghan militants crossed the border against the nearby Bajaur Agency, attacking three villages. Though NATO had often complained about Pakistan’s lack of control over the tribal area, increasingly it is cross-border attacks from both NATO and the militants coming into Pakistan, not the other way around.

:: Article nr. 78743 sent on 18-jun-2011 15:26 ECT
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“The more you tighten your grip, the more Star Systems will slip through your fingers.”

An MOD spokesperson told the Bureau of Investigative Journalism: “The UK has been asked to withdraw some of its training support teams on a temporary basis by the Pakistan government in response to security concerns.”

The Government has become increasingly weary of Western operations in the region following the extremely dubious assassination of Osama Bin Laden, who according to Western governments had been hiding in Abbottabad, Pakistan, possibly with knowledge of Pakistan officials.

Although there is no evidence of Bin Laden’s death, Pakistan has still been put in a difficult position on the world stage, essentially being accused of working in cahoots with Al Qaeda. It’s only logical that they want the Western empire out.

Around a hundred US trainers have already been given their marching orders.

Mainstream Coverage @ The BBC_________________'Come and see the violence inherent in the system.
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08-01-2011 13:36 BJT
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KASHGAR, Aug. 1 (Xinhua) -- A group of religious extremists led by militants trained in overseas terrorist camps was behind the weekend attack on civilians in China's far-western Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region that left 6 dead and 15 others wounded, the local government said Monday.
The initial probe found that the group's leaders had learned how to make explosives and firearms in overseas camps of the terrorist group "East Turkistan Islamic Movement" (ETIM) in Pakistan before entering Xinjiang to organize terrorist activities, the government of Kashgar City said in an online statement.
Six civilians were killed, 15 others -- including three policemen -- were injured after attackers set fire to a restaurant and started randomly killing civilians in Kashgar on Sunday. Five suspects were shot dead by police.
The government on Monday also issued arrest warrants for two suspects who fled the scene. The two have been identified as 29-year-old Memtieli Tiliwaldi and 34-year-old Turson Hasan. Both are local ethnic Uygurs, according to the warrants.
The police have offered 100,000 yuan (15,384 U.S. dollars) for information which could lead to their arrests.
Pan Zhiping, a researcher with the Central Asia Studies Institute under the Xinjiang Academy of Social Sciences, called the ETIM "the most violent and dangerous" among the "East Turkistan" separatist forces. He said the organization is based somewhere along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.
The ETIM traditionally trains its members for suicide bombings and car bombings before sending them to Xinjiang. But today more are using the Internet to penetrate the border to spread bomb-making techniques, Pan and other long-time Xinjiang observers said.
The United Nations and the Chinese government have labeled the ETIM an international terrorist organization.
The Sunday attack was the second violent case in Kashgar over the weekend. On Saturday night, two people hijacked a truck after killing the driver and drove it into crowded street. The suspects then jumped out of the truck and hacked bystanders randomly.
Eight civilians were killed while 27 others were injured. One of the suspects was killed in the clash while the other was apprehended.
The local government did not specifically label Saturday's attack as an act of terrorism.
Zhang Chunxian, secretary of Xinjiang regional committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC), has ordered a crackdown on terrorist attacks, religious extremist forces, and illegal religious activities at an emergency meeting held in the regional capital Urumqi following the attacks.
Zhang also ordered strengthened management of explosives.
He said the violent attacks would greatly damage the region's stability.
"People in Xinjiang should stay vigilant and recognize that terrorist attackers are the 'common enemies of all ethnic groups,'" Zhang said.
Xinjiang -- with 41.5 percent of its population Uygurs, a largely Muslim Chinese ethnic group -- is China's frontline against terrorism. The region borders eight central and western Asian countries, many of which have been attacked by terrorist and extremist militant groups.

– Mon Aug 1, 1:21 am ET
BEIJING (AFP) – A deadly weekend attack in China's restive Xinjiang region was masterminded by "terrorists" trained in Pakistan, the local government said Monday.
Fourteen people were killed in two attacks at the weekend in the ancient Silk Road city of Kashgar, and five alleged attackers were in turn shot dead by police in the wave of violence.
The Kashgar authorities said in a statement on their website that initial investigations found that the perpetrators of one attack learned explosive-making skills in terrorist-run camps in Pakistan.
"The heads of the group had learned skills of making explosives and firearms in overseas camps of the terrorist group East Turkistan Islamic Movement in Pakistan before entering Xinjiang," the online statement said.
Remote Xinjiang has seen several outbreaks of ethnic violence in recent years as the mainly Muslim Uighur minority bridles under what it sees as government oppression and the unwanted immigration of ethnic Han Chinese.
Last month, more than 20 people were killed in a clash with police in the remote city of Hotan.
Monday's statement appeared to refer only to an on a restaurant in Kashgar that took place on Sunday.
That came less than 24 hours after an earlier incident in which a truck that was waiting at a light at the food market in Kashgar, not far from the border with Kyrgyzstan, was reportedly hijacked.
Tianshannet.com, a website run by the regional government, reported that the attackers killed the driver, ploughed the vehicle into passers-by on a nearby pavement, then got out of the truck and stabbed people at random.
Six bystanders were killed before the crowd turned on them and killed one attacker, the report said.
Many Uighurs are unhappy with what they say has been decades of political and religious repression, and the unwanted immigration of China's dominant Han ethnic group.
While standards of living have improved, Uighurs complain that most of the gains go to the Han.
This tension has triggered sporadic bouts of violence in Xinjiang -- a vast, arid but resource-rich region which is home to more than eight million Turkic-speaking Uighurs.
State media quoted an official in Xinjiang calling the Hotan clash in July a "terrorist" attack.
But Uighur activists called it an outburst of anger by ordinary Uighurs and said security forces killed 20 people during the unrest.
In the nation's worst ethnic violence in decades, Uighurs savagely attacked Han Chinese in the regional capital Urumqi in July 2009 -- an incident that led to retaliatory attacks by Han on Uighurs several days later.
The government says around 200 people were killed and 1,700 injured in the violence, which cast doubt on the authoritarian Communist Party's claims of harmony among the country's dozens of ethnic groups.

Chinese terrorist killing Uyghur Muslim in East Turkistan

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“The more you tighten your grip, the more Star Systems will slip through your fingers.”

Pakistanis have held a mass protest to condemn US assassination drone strikes, saying the attacks kill more civilians than terrorists, Press TVreports.
Some 2,000 people and activists from Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf gathered in front of the parliament building in Islamabad on Friday to voice their outrage at the non-UN-sanctioned strikes.

They said the attacks on the tribal region on Pakistan’s northwestern border with Afghanistan kill more civilians than Taliban or al-Qaeda terrorists.

Protesters called on Pakistani lawmakers to pass a resolution to put an end to the deadly assassination attacks by CIA agents in the country’s northwestern tribal belt.

This is while, Pakistani tribal elders have met in the capital to unanimously vote for a resolution urging Islamabad to take immediate action to stop the killings of civilians by US drones.

An assembly of tribal elders (jirga) also demanded the International Court of Law to take action against US President Barack Obama’s administration for not halting CIA-run operations on the Pakistani soil.

“We have run slides on the screens, showing images of innocent women and children to the participants of the jirga, and proved that the US is killing civilians under the pretext of hunting militants,” Kamran Khan, a deputy from North Waziristan said after the tribal meeting.

“We are united against the US atrocities and will fight against American terrorism,” said Adeel Khan, a local elder from South Waziristan.

Civilians have been the major victims of US assassination drone attacks, carried out regularly against Pakistan’s North and South Waziristan tribal regions.

Washington says the strikes are aimed at targeting anti-US and pro-Taliban militants, but Pakistani officials say civilians are the main victims of the unauthorized attacks.

Aerial attacks by the US remote-controlled aircraft have killed hundreds of people in the volatile regions over the past years.

The operation, initiated by former US President George W. Bush, has escalated under incumbent Obama.

The UN has condemned the US use of combat drones against other countries as a blatant violation of international law.

Philip Alston, UN special envoy on extrajudicial killings, said in a report in late October 2010 that the attacks were undermining the rules designed to protect the right of life.

Alston also said he feared that the drone killings by the US Central Intelligence Agency could develop a “playstation” mentality._________________'Come and see the violence inherent in the system.
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Pakistan orders US to leave airbase in row over deadly Nato assaulthttp://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/27/pakistan-orders-us-leave-s hamsi-airbase?intcmp=239
Islamabad says US must leave Shamsi base in 15 days after deaths of at least 24 Pakistani soldiers in mistaken attack
Saeed Shah in Karachi - guardian.co.uk, Sunday 27 November 2011
Pakistan has given the US 15 days to vacate an airbase used as a key launchpad for drone strikes in Afghanistan in retaliation for a mistaken attack on a Pakistani border outpost that killed at least 24 soldiers and injured 13.
American forces were told to leave the remote Shamsi airbase, secretly given over to the US after 9/11, following an emergency meeting of Pakistan's top civilian and military leadership late on Saturday. Pakistan has also blocked supply routes for US-led troops in Afghanistan.

Shamsi was used heavily for launching the war in Afghanistan in late 2001, and later served as the base for the US drone programme. Set in sparsely populated desert in the western Baluchistan province, Shamsi is highly controversial within Pakistan for its association with drones, which Islamabad officially condemns.

Location of Nato attack and Shamsi airbase.

The decision of the country's defence committee of the cabinet is an admission that Shamsi remains in American hands. The committee announced that the government would "revisit and undertake a complete review of all programmes, activities and co-operative arrangements" with the US, and US-led forces in Afghanistan, "including diplomatic, political, military and intelligence".
Relations between Islamabad and Washington were already under deep strain before the incident, in which helicopters from the International Security Assistance Force (Isaf) operating in Afghanistan shelled checkpoints on the Pakistani side, apparently in error.
"These attacks, which constituted breach of sovereignty, were violative of international law and had gravely dented the fundamental basis of Pakistan's co-operation with Nato/Isaf against militancy and terror," said a statement issued by the committee, which is chaired by the prime minister and includes the army chief. "Nato/Isaf attacks were also violative of their mandate, which was confined to Afghanistan."
The deaths of the Pakistani soldiers will fuel anti-American sentiment in Pakistan, a key US ally. Although there have been previous deaths of Pakistani troops caused by mistaken fire from coalition aircraft, the scale of the bloodshed this time was far greater. Pakistan's army chief, Ashfaq Kayani, put the death toll at 24. Other reports put the number killed as high as 28.
The border between Pakistan's tribal area and Afghanistan is poorly marked. Insurgents who use the tribal area as a safe haven often fire on coalition and Afghan troops from positions close to Pakistani checkpoints, raising US suspicions that the Pakistani military collaborates with the insurgents.
Isaf and the Pakistan military have poor communication and maps of Pakistani checkpoints and the Afghan border do not always match.
The attack took place in the early hours of Saturday morning, at about 2am local time, at an outpost on a mountain about 1.5 miles from the border, in the Mohmand part of the tribal area. Mohmand borders both Kunar and Nangarhar provinces in eastern Afghanistan.
The defence committee confirmed that the supply routes for the coalition through Pakistan had been stopped. Around half the supplies for international troops in Afghanistan pass by road through Pakistan. Pakistani television showed lines of trucks carrying containers lined up at border.
Two years ago a similar border incident in which two Pakistani soldiers died after they were mistaken for insurgents led to Pakistan closing the border for 10 days.
On Sunday the US ambassador to Islamabad, Cameron Munter, who was summoned to Pakistan's foreign ministry for an official protest, pledged that the US would "work closely with Pakistan to investigate this incident". However, neither he nor the American general in charge of coalition troops in Afghanistan, General John Allen, admitted the US had caused the deaths or provided any details.
Allen had visited Islamabad a day earlier for talks with Kayani "aimed at enhancing border control on both sides".
While Pakistan officially condemns the operation of US drones on its territory, which strike suspected militants in the tribal area, it quietly continues to co-operate with aspects of the drone programme. It is believed that drones still use Shamsi, but it is unclear whether they are armed or purely for surveillance. Most of the drone flights have switched to an airbase at Jalalabad in Afghanistan.
Pakistan's previous threats to expel the US from Shamsi were never carried out. Pakistan's co-operation is considered vital to the US in Afghanistan, both in mopping up al-Qaida, whose remaining leadership is still believed to be hiding there, and to help stabilise the country.
Following a series of bitter disputes this year, military and intelligence co-operation between the US and Pakistan was scaled back with the end of a training programme in counter-insurgency for Pakistani soldiers and a big reduction in CIA personnel and activities.
Relations were shattered first by the furore surrounding a CIA contractor who shot dead two Pakistanis in Lahore. Then in May the unilateral US special forces raid that found and killed Osama bin Laden in northern Pakistan torpedoed what goodwill remained.
Western officials allege that Pakistan has played a "double-game" since 2001, by allying with the US but at the same time providing support to the Taliban and other Afghan insurgents._________________www.lawyerscommitteefor9-11inquiry.orgwww.rethink911.orgwww.patriotsquestion911.comwww.actorsandartistsfor911truth.orgwww.mediafor911truth.orgwww.pilotsfor911truth.orgwww.mp911truth.orgwww.ae911truth.orgwww.rl911truth.orgwww.stj911.orgwww.v911t.orgwww.thisweek.org.ukwww.abolishwar.org.ukwww.elementary.org.ukwww.radio4all.net/index.php/contributor/2149http://utangente.free.fr/2003/media2003.pdf
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Officials: US drone-fired missiles kill 8 people in Pakistan
Published February 07, 2012
| Associated Press

PESHAWAR, Pakistan – U.S. drone-fired missiles hit a house in Pakistan's northwest tribal region near the Afghan border Wednesday, killing eight people, Pakistani intelligence officials said.
The attack occurred in Spalga village in the North Waziristan tribal area, said the officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media. The identities of those killed were unknown, but the area is dominated by Hafiz Gul Bahadur, a prominent militant commander focused on fighting foreign

The U.S. does not publicly discuss details of the covert CIA-run drone program in Pakistan.
The program has caused tensions with Pakistan. Although the government is widely believed to have provided support for the strikes in the past, that cooperation has become strained as its relationship with Washington has deteriorated.
Pakistan kicked the U.S. out of a base used by American drones last year in retaliation for American airstrikes that accidentally killed 24 Pakistani troops at two Afghan border posts on Nov. 26.
The move is not expected to significantly impact drone operations, but the pace of strikes has slowed since the border incident as the U.S. has tried to repair the relationship with Pakistan.
Pakistan also retaliated for the errant airstrikes by closing its Afghan border crossings to supplies meant for NATO troops in Afghanistan.
Pakistani Defense Minister Ahmad Mukhtar said Tuesday that the country should reopen the crossings after negotiating a better deal with the coalition.
He did not provide specific details. But other Pakistani officials have suggested that the government levy additional fees on the coalition for using the route because the heavy trucks damage roads.
The closure has forced the United States to spend six times as much money to send supplies to Afghanistan through alternative routes.
Pakistan's parliament is expected to vote on a revised framework for relations with the U.S. in mid-February that could pave the way for the government to reopen the supply line.
Pakistani Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar said last week that she didn't think it would be much of a problem to reopen the route after the parliament vote.
The defense minister echoed this view, saying, "I think the people who are deciding, who are giving recommendations, will make the right decision."
For most of the 10-year war in Afghanistan, 90 percent of supplies shipped to coalition forces came through Pakistan, via the port of Karachi. But over the past three years, NATO has increased its road and rail shipments through an alternate route that runs through Russia and Central Asia. The northern route was longer and more expensive, but provided a hedge against the riskier Pakistan route.
Before the accidental American airstrikes on Nov. 26, about 30 percent of non-lethal supplies for U.S. and coalition troops in Afghanistan traveled through Pakistan.
The U.S. has since increased the amount of supplies running through the northern route, but this has cost it a lot more money. Pentagon figures provided to the AP show that the alternative transport is costing about $104 million per month, $87 million more per month than when the cargo moved through Pakistan.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has threatened Pakistan with sanctions if the country continues with plans to build a natural gas pipeline to Iran.

The U.S. is moving to squeeze Iran financially in a bid to force it to drop its nuclear program. But Pakistan has been unwilling to line up behind the U.S., saying it needs Iran, a neighbor, to help it meet a massive energy shortage.

Mrs. Clinton told a U.S. House of Representatives subcommittee Wednesday that sanctions could be triggered if Islamabad presses ahead. As Pakistan’s economy already is in dire straits, the sanctions could be “particularly damaging” and “further undermine their economic status,” Mrs. Clinton said.

Pakistan’s top bureaucrat in the Petroleum and Natural Resources Ministry, Muhammad Ejaz Chaudhry, said the pipeline was crucial for Pakistan’s energy security – the longstanding Pakistan position. But he added that Pakistan was “committed not to create any problems.” A spokesman for the Foreign Ministry was not immediately available to comment.

“Pakistan has announced that the multi-billion-dollar gas pipeline deal with Iran is still on, despite the US pressure,” Iran’s official Islamic Republic News Agency said in a report Thursday. Tehran says its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes.

The pressure on Pakistan comes as the U.S. is calling on India, China and Turkey to reduce their imports of Iranian crude oil. Mrs. Clinton said earlier this week the U.S. was having “very intense and very blunt” conversations with the three countries on the issue.

The U.S. also has been disrupting financial networks that Tehran relies on to get foreign currency for its oil sales.

The pressure appears to be having some success. The European Union agreed in January to ban Iranian oil imports from July 1. India has stood firm in public, saying it needs Iranian oil. But Indian news reports say the country has quietly been seeking increased oil supplies from Saudi Arabia and Iraq in a bid to wean itself off Iranian supply.

The threat to Pakistan comes amid very poor relations between Islamabad and Washington. The two nations are ostensibly allies in the war against the Taliban. But the U.S. blames Pakistan for continuing to support some elements of the Taliban, a charge Pakistan denies. Military and civilian officials in Pakistan were vexed by the U.S. decision in 2005 to enhance civilian nuclear cooperation with India, while denying a similar deal to them.

Pakistan is building civilian nuclear reactors with China’s help but says it needs to do more to ensure its energy security.

Work on the Pakistan-Iran pipeline, which is to link Iran’s South Pars gas field with Pakistan’s Baluchistan and Sindh provinces, has not yet begun. An earlier plan to extend the pipeline through to India, at a total cost of $7 billion, was dropped after New Delhi pulled out under pressure from the U.S.

The current project is valued at $1.5 billion and is scheduled for completion by 2014, Mr. Chaudhry said. Once operations begin, Iran has committed to supply 750 million cubic feet of gas per day for 25 years.

Pakistan relies on gas for half its energy needs but domestic supplies are declining, forcing the country to rely on imports. The gas shortages have contributed to an energy shortfall which means most parts of the country suffer lengthy blackouts on a daily basis.

You can follow Tom and India Real Time on Twitter @TomWrightAsia and @indiarealtime.

On Wednesday, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton threatened sanctions if Pakistan goes ahead with the $1.5 billion pipeline, a project which Washington views as undermining its attempts to squeeze Iran to drop its nuclear program. The next day, Pakistan Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar hit back hard.

Last week, Dana Rohrabacher, a Republican from California, introduced a resolution recognizing Baluchistan’s right to self-determination. (Baluch people live primarily in Pakistan, Iran and Afghanistan.)

And there it might have sunk without notice, like many bills that are put before Congress.

_________________'Come and see the violence inherent in the system.
Help, help, I'm being repressed!'

“The more you tighten your grip, the more Star Systems will slip through your fingers.”

America's deadly double tap drone attacks are 'killing 49 people for every known terrorist in Pakistan'
Study found war against violent Islamists has become increasingly deadly
Researchers blame common tactic now being used – the 'double-tap' strike
Drone strikes condemned for their ineffectiveness in targeting militants

Just one in 50 victims of America’s deadly drone strikes in Pakistan are terrorists – while the rest are innocent civilians, a new report claimed today.

The authoritative joint study, by Stanford and New York Universities, concludes that men, women and children are being terrorised by the operations ’24 hours-a-day’.

And the authors lay much of the blame on the use of the ‘double-tap’ strike where a drone fires one missile – and then a second as rescuers try to drag victims from the rubble. One aid agency said they had a six-hour delay before going to the scene.

The tactic has cast such a shadow of fear over strike zones that people often wait for hours before daring to visit the scene of an attack. Investigators also discovered that communities living in fear of the drones were suffering severe stress and related illnesses. Many parents had taken their children out of school because they were so afraid of a missile-strike.

Bombardment: More than 345 strikes have hit Pakistan's tribal areas near the border with Afghanistan in the past eight years

Today campaigners savaged the use of drones, claiming that they were destroying a way of life.

Clive Stafford Smith, director of the charity Reprieve which helped interview people for the report, said: ‘This shows that drone strikes go much further than simply killing innocent civilians. An entire region is being terrorised by the constant threat of death from the skies. ‘

There have been at least 345 strikes in Pakistan’s tribal areas near the border with Afghanistan in the past eight years.

'These strikes are becoming much more common,' Mirza Shahzad Akbar, a Pakistani lawyer who represents victims of drone strikes, told The Independent.

'In the past it used to be a one-off, every now and then. Now almost every other attack is a double tap. There is no justification for it.'

The study is the product of nine months' research and more than 130 interviews, it is one of the most exhaustive attempts by academics to understand – and evaluate – Washington's drone wars.

The site of a missile attack in Tappi, a village 12 miles east of Miranshah, near the Afghan border after a U.S. missile attack by a pilotless drone aircraft in 2008. At least six people were killed

Tribesmen gather near a damaged car outside a house after a missile struck in Dandi Darpakheil village on the outskirts of Miranshah, the main town in the North Waziristan tribal region
VOICES FROM THE DRONE ZONE

Sadaullah Khan, a 15-year-old who lost both legs in a drone strike, says that before his injury, 'I used to go to school…I thought I would become a doctor. After the drone strikes, I stopped going to school.'

Noor Behram, a journalist: 'Once there has been a drone strike, people have gone in for rescue missions, and five or ten minutes after the drone attack, they attack the rescuers who are there.'

Taxi driver: 'Whether we are driving a car, or we are working on a farm, or we are sitting at home playing cards – no matter what we are doing we are always thinking the drone will strike us. So we are scared to do anything, no matter what.'

Safdar Dawar, President of the Tribal Union of Journalists: 'If I am walking in the market, I have this fear that maybe the person walking next to me is going to be a target of the drone. If I’m shopping, I’m really careful and scared. If I’m standing on the road and there is a car parked next to me, I never know if that is going to be the target. Maybe they will target the car in front of me or behind me. Even in mosques, if we’re praying, we’re worried that maybe one person who is standing with us praying is wanted. So, wherever we are, we have this fear of drones.'

Resident from the Manzar Khel area: 'Now (they have) even targeted funerals…they have targeted people sitting together, so people are scared of everything'

Despite assurances the attacks are 'surgical', researchers found barely two per cent of their victims are known militants and that the idea that the strikes make the world a safer place for the U.S. is 'ambiguous at best'.

Researchers added that traumatic effects of the strikes go far beyond fatalities, psychologically battering a population which lives under the daily threat of annihilation from the air, and ruining the local economy.

They conclude by calling on Washington completely to reassess its drone-strike programme or risk alienating the very people they hope to win over.

They also observe that the strikes set worrying precedents for extra-judicial killings at a time when many nations are building up their unmanned weapon arsenals.

The Obama administration is unlikely to heed their demands given the zeal with which America has expanded its drone programme over the past two years.

Washington says the drone program is vital to combating militants that threaten the U.S. and who use Pakistan's tribal regions as a safe haven.

The number of attacks have fallen since a Nato strike in 2011 killed 24 Pakistani soldiers and strained U.S.-Pakistan relations.

Pakistan wants the drone strikes stopped - or it wants to control the drones directly - something the U.S. refuses.

Reapers and Predators are now active over the skies of Somalia and Yemen as well as Pakistan and - less covertly - Afghanistan.

But campaigners like Mr Akbar hope the Stanford/New York University research may start to make an impact on the American public.

'It's an important piece of work,' he told The Independent. 'No one in the U.S. wants to listen to a Pakistani lawyer saying these strikes are wrong. But they might listen to American academics.'

Today, Pakistani intelligence officials revealed a pair of missiles fired from an unmanned American spy aircraft slammed into a militant hideout in northwestern Pakistan last night.

The two officials said missiles from the drone aircraft hit the village of Dawar Musaki in the North Waziristan region, which borders Afghanistan to the west.

Some of the dead were believed to be foreign fighters but the officials did not know how many or where they were from.

The Monday strike was the second in three days. On Saturday a U.S. drone fired two missiles at a vehicle in northwest Pakistan, killing four suspected militants.

That attack took place in the village of Mohammed Khel, also in North Waziristan.

North Waziristan is the last tribal region in which the Pakistan military has not launched an operation against militants, although the U.S. has been continually pushing for such a move.

ISLAMABAD -- The Pakistani government has the right to shoot down U.S. drones if Washington ignores warnings to halt the "illegal" aerial attacks, a Pakistani court ruled Thursday.

"The government of Pakistan and its security forces shall ensure that in future such drone strikes are not conducted and carried out within the sovereign territory of Pakistan," said a two-judge panel led by Peshawar High Court Chief Justice Dost Muhammad Khan.

Khan said in the 22-page judgement that the drone attacks carried out against "a handful of alleged militants who are not engaged in combat with the U.S. authorities or forces" breached international laws so they were "absolutely illegal and blatant violations" of national sovereignty.

The court also declared the drone strikes "a war crime" and directed the Pakistani government to request the United Nations form a tribunal to investigate and render a final verdict on whether the airstrikes constitute war crimes.

The judgment decided a set of identical petitions challenging the drone campaign against Islamist militants entrenched in Pakistan's tribal region bordering Afghanistan.

The judges said the United States committed a "serial killing" of civilians in the North and South Waziristan tribal districts that began in 2008. They cited the local administration as saying 1,449 civilians had been killed and 335 critically injured through the end of 2012.

"The civilian casualties ... [are] an uncondonable crime on the part of U.S. authorities, including the CIA, and it is held so," said the judgment, which described President Barack Obama, the Pentagon and Central Intelligence Agency as the "decision-making troika" behind the drone campaign.

Mirza Shahzad Akbar, a human rights activist and one of the lawyers for the victims of drone attacks, described the verdict as a landmark.

The Pakistan government's previous statements that the drone strikes are illegal were considered just an opinion, but now the same judgement has been handed down from a court, making the case much stronger, he said.

"If even now the drone strikes continue, at least we will have the right to approach the judiciary, and the court itself has the inherent jurisdiction to prosecute the federal government, prime minister or the president for contempt," Akbar said.

Pakistan publicly condemns the drone campaign, describing it as illegal and counterproductive to its own fight against militants, but many analysts and observers said they believe the strikes are carried out with Islamabad's tacit approval.

Last month, Pakistan's former military strongman Pervez Musharraf told the U.S. broadcaster CNN that his country secretly approved a few U.S. drone strikes.

America's deadly double tap drone attacks are 'killing 49 people for every known terrorist in Pakistan'
Study found war against violent Islamists has become increasingly deadly
Researchers blame common tactic now being used – the 'double-tap' strike
Drone strikes condemned for their ineffectiveness in targeting militants

Just one in 50 victims of America’s deadly drone strikes in Pakistan are terrorists – while the rest are innocent civilians, a new report claimed today.

The authoritative joint study, by Stanford and New York Universities, concludes that men, women and children are being terrorised by the operations ’24 hours-a-day’.

And the authors lay much of the blame on the use of the ‘double-tap’ strike where a drone fires one missile – and then a second as rescuers try to drag victims from the rubble. One aid agency said they had a six-hour delay before going to the scene.

The tactic has cast such a shadow of fear over strike zones that people often wait for hours before daring to visit the scene of an attack. Investigators also discovered that communities living in fear of the drones were suffering severe stress and related illnesses. Many parents had taken their children out of school because they were so afraid of a missile-strike.

Bombardment: More than 345 strikes have hit Pakistan's tribal areas near the border with Afghanistan in the past eight years

Today campaigners savaged the use of drones, claiming that they were destroying a way of life.

Clive Stafford Smith, director of the charity Reprieve which helped interview people for the report, said: ‘This shows that drone strikes go much further than simply killing innocent civilians. An entire region is being terrorised by the constant threat of death from the skies. ‘

There have been at least 345 strikes in Pakistan’s tribal areas near the border with Afghanistan in the past eight years.

'These strikes are becoming much more common,' Mirza Shahzad Akbar, a Pakistani lawyer who represents victims of drone strikes, told The Independent.

'In the past it used to be a one-off, every now and then. Now almost every other attack is a double tap. There is no justification for it.'

The study is the product of nine months' research and more than 130 interviews, it is one of the most exhaustive attempts by academics to understand – and evaluate – Washington's drone wars.

The site of a missile attack in Tappi, a village 12 miles east of Miranshah, near the Afghan border after a U.S. missile attack by a pilotless drone aircraft in 2008. At least six people were killed

Tribesmen gather near a damaged car outside a house after a missile struck in Dandi Darpakheil village on the outskirts of Miranshah, the main town in the North Waziristan tribal region
VOICES FROM THE DRONE ZONE

Sadaullah Khan, a 15-year-old who lost both legs in a drone strike, says that before his injury, 'I used to go to school…I thought I would become a doctor. After the drone strikes, I stopped going to school.'

Noor Behram, a journalist: 'Once there has been a drone strike, people have gone in for rescue missions, and five or ten minutes after the drone attack, they attack the rescuers who are there.'

Taxi driver: 'Whether we are driving a car, or we are working on a farm, or we are sitting at home playing cards – no matter what we are doing we are always thinking the drone will strike us. So we are scared to do anything, no matter what.'

Safdar Dawar, President of the Tribal Union of Journalists: 'If I am walking in the market, I have this fear that maybe the person walking next to me is going to be a target of the drone. If I’m shopping, I’m really careful and scared. If I’m standing on the road and there is a car parked next to me, I never know if that is going to be the target. Maybe they will target the car in front of me or behind me. Even in mosques, if we’re praying, we’re worried that maybe one person who is standing with us praying is wanted. So, wherever we are, we have this fear of drones.'

Resident from the Manzar Khel area: 'Now (they have) even targeted funerals…they have targeted people sitting together, so people are scared of everything'

Despite assurances the attacks are 'surgical', researchers found barely two per cent of their victims are known militants and that the idea that the strikes make the world a safer place for the U.S. is 'ambiguous at best'.

Researchers added that traumatic effects of the strikes go far beyond fatalities, psychologically battering a population which lives under the daily threat of annihilation from the air, and ruining the local economy.

They conclude by calling on Washington completely to reassess its drone-strike programme or risk alienating the very people they hope to win over.

They also observe that the strikes set worrying precedents for extra-judicial killings at a time when many nations are building up their unmanned weapon arsenals.

The Obama administration is unlikely to heed their demands given the zeal with which America has expanded its drone programme over the past two years.

Washington says the drone program is vital to combating militants that threaten the U.S. and who use Pakistan's tribal regions as a safe haven.

The number of attacks have fallen since a Nato strike in 2011 killed 24 Pakistani soldiers and strained U.S.-Pakistan relations.

Pakistan wants the drone strikes stopped - or it wants to control the drones directly - something the U.S. refuses.

Reapers and Predators are now active over the skies of Somalia and Yemen as well as Pakistan and - less covertly - Afghanistan.

But campaigners like Mr Akbar hope the Stanford/New York University research may start to make an impact on the American public.

'It's an important piece of work,' he told The Independent. 'No one in the U.S. wants to listen to a Pakistani lawyer saying these strikes are wrong. But they might listen to American academics.'

Today, Pakistani intelligence officials revealed a pair of missiles fired from an unmanned American spy aircraft slammed into a militant hideout in northwestern Pakistan last night.

The two officials said missiles from the drone aircraft hit the village of Dawar Musaki in the North Waziristan region, which borders Afghanistan to the west.

Some of the dead were believed to be foreign fighters but the officials did not know how many or where they were from.

The Monday strike was the second in three days. On Saturday a U.S. drone fired two missiles at a vehicle in northwest Pakistan, killing four suspected militants.

That attack took place in the village of Mohammed Khel, also in North Waziristan.

North Waziristan is the last tribal region in which the Pakistan military has not launched an operation against militants, although the U.S. has been continually pushing for such a move.

The Pakistanis contend that their military is already overstretched fighting operations in other areas but many in the U.S. believe they are reluctant to carry out an operation because of their longstanding ties to some of the militants operating there such as the Haqqani network

Two suicide bombers have attacked a church in northwest Pakistan, killing at least 50 people including 4 children, local officials told AP. Eyewitnesses said around 600 people had gathered for Sunday mass in the church.

Commissioner Sahibzada Anees said that over 70 people were injured in the twin blasts in the Kohati Gate district of the city of Peshawar. The attackers detonated their explosives as worshippers filed out of a Sunday prayer service.

"Six hundred people were inside the church when the blast took place," deputy commissioner Zaheerul Islam told Pakistan's private Geo TV.

A drone victim, journalist and activist who has spoken out against drone strikes in Pakistan was kidnapped by fifteen to twenty men in the early hours of February 5. He is missing and a judge in Pakistan has ordered the Pakistani intelligence services to produce him by February 20.

Kareem Khan has been pushing a legal case against the CIA and Pakistan government, seeking to hold them accountable for the killing of his son and brother in December 2009. He submitted a complaint against former CIA station chief in Pakistan, Jonathan Banks, for his alleged role in the drone attack that left his family dead.

His application to register the case against Banks, according to Channel 4 News, said: “Jonathan Banks is operating from the US embassy in Islamabad which is a clear violation of diplomatic norms and laws, as a foreign mission cannot be used for any criminal activity within a sovereign state.” Khan alleged that Banks had a “business visa,” which meant he did not have “diplomatic status” and was not immune from prosecution.

The human rights organization, Reprieve, indicated, ”Khan was due to fly to Europe on February 15 in order to address “German, Dutch and British Parliamentarians about his personal experience with drone strikes and and his work as a freelance journalist investigating other strikes in the region.”

Khan’s brother-in-law, Dilbar Jan, filed a report on his disappearance with police. Jan told Agence France-Presse, “The kids, my sister, my uncle and I are all very worried and anxious.” He was taken by fifteen to twenty people, some dressed in police uniforms. His young nephews and him saw the kidnapping.

Afraid, Jan added, “We haven’t done anything that is anti-state, nor do any of us have bad intentions towards anyone,” and, “We’re from an educated family, we’re all government employees, I myself am a teacher. We can’t think of doing something wrong.”

Reprieve’s Executive Director Claire Alger said in a statement, “It has now been a week since anyone has seen or heard from Kareem Khan. The Pakistani Government must immediately tell us where he is and why they have tried to silence such an important anti-drones voice. Failure to do so raises disturbing questions of continued PK complicity in the US drone program.”

Shahzad Akbar, Khan’s lawyer who has been fighting to stop drone strikes in Pakistan’s courts, reacted, “This is a completely illegal disappearance, which means some kind of pressure is being applied through his disappearance to the other drone victims.”

Akbar was at a hearing in the Rawalpindi Bench of the Lahore High Court to convince the court to help him figure out where Khan is being held. It is believed the intelligence services must have Khan because the police claim to know nothing about his abduction. The Ministry of Interior now has a week to find Khan and bring him before the court.

On “Democracy Now!,” documentary filmmaker and journalist Madiha Tahir, who interviewed Khan for her film, “Wounds of Waziristan,” said:

Karim is the first, that I know of, that has been picked up who is an anti-drone activist, but disappearances in Pakistan are very common. It’s a common state tactic. It has been happening in Balochistan, where there is a separatist movement, for a long time now. And, in fact, three are families protesting. There were mass graves found in Balochistan of missing people quite recently, only a few weeks ago. So this is a very common tactic by the state, and now, clearly, the Pakistani establishment, which is to say the intelligence agencies and the Pakistani army, want to send a message to the anti-drone movement to tell us to—you know, to tell the movement to shut up, basically.

A page on the “Wounds of Waziristan” website has been dedicated to Khan, with a call to people around the world to engage in a “Twitter Storm” with the hashtag #FreeKareem to hopefully get authorities to find him and have him freed.

Activists from the peace group, CODEPINK, are holding a demonstration outside the Pakistani embassy in Washington, DC, this afternoon.

A press release from the group reported, “Members of CODEPINK have met with Pakistani officials in the Washington, DC embassy and handed in over 6,500 petition signatures demanding Khan’s release. They have also been working with Congressional representatives from the Foreign Affairs Committees and met with State Dept Deputy Director Anne Patterson asking for her assistance.”

While it is unclear at the moment what role the United States might have played in Khan’s disappearance—or, more specifically, what role the CIA may have played, it should not go unmentioned that US intelligence agencies have sought to neutralize drone opponents.

Akbar was not granted a visa by the State Department to visit the US when he wanted to come and help translate testimony from Pakistani drone victims scheduled to testify to members of Congress.

When I interviewed Akbar at a “Drone Summit” organized by CODEPINK on April 28, 2012, he talked about how the US and especially the CIA became unhappy with him after he began his work in October 2010 because it bumped up against the narrative that the US was only killing “bad guys.” He found through work with victims that the US was mainly killing civilians and innocent people in Waziristan, who have nothing against the US. (He was representing Kareem Khan.)

“The US government has a long history of treating drone opponents as national security threats,” according to journalist Glenn Greenwald. ”In 2012, it denied a visa to filmmaker Muhammad Danish Qasim, a Pakistani student at Iqra University’s Media Science. He had released a short film entitled The Other Side, a 20-minute narrative that ‘revolves around the idea of assessing social, psychological and economical effects of drones on the people in tribal areas of Pakistan.’ The film highlighted the pain and havoc wreaked on surviving children and other relatives of drone victims. The visa denial meant he was barred from receiving the Audience Award for Best International Film at the 2012 National Film Festival For Talented Youth, held annually in Seattle, Washington.”

Drone opponents are viewed as individuals participating in a “propaganda” campaign against the US. Their success in turning people against drones is seen as detrimental to the ability of the US to wage the so-called war on terrorism effectively.

There is no evidence at the moment that suggests the US or, specifically, the CIA kidnapped Khan. But let’s admit the record of the US does not allay suspicion.

A drone victim, journalist and activist who has spoken out against drone strikes in Pakistan was kidnapped by fifteen to twenty men in the early hours of February 5. He is missing and a judge in Pakistan has ordered the Pakistani intelligence services to produce him by February 20.

Kareem Khan has been pushing a legal case against the CIA and Pakistan government, seeking to hold them accountable for the killing of his son and brother in December 2009. He submitted a complaint against former CIA station chief in Pakistan, Jonathan Banks, for his alleged role in the drone attack that left his family dead.

His application to register the case against Banks, according to Channel 4 News, said: “Jonathan Banks is operating from the US embassy in Islamabad which is a clear violation of diplomatic norms and laws, as a foreign mission cannot be used for any criminal activity within a sovereign state.” Khan alleged that Banks had a “business visa,” which meant he did not have “diplomatic status” and was not immune from prosecution.

The human rights organization, Reprieve, indicated, ”Khan was due to fly to Europe on February 15 in order to address “German, Dutch and British Parliamentarians about his personal experience with drone strikes and and his work as a freelance journalist investigating other strikes in the region.”

Khan’s brother-in-law, Dilbar Jan, filed a report on his disappearance with police. Jan told Agence France-Presse, “The kids, my sister, my uncle and I are all very worried and anxious.” He was taken by fifteen to twenty people, some dressed in police uniforms. His young nephews and him saw the kidnapping.

Afraid, Jan added, “We haven’t done anything that is anti-state, nor do any of us have bad intentions towards anyone,” and, “We’re from an educated family, we’re all government employees, I myself am a teacher. We can’t think of doing something wrong.”

Reprieve’s Executive Director Claire Alger said in a statement, “It has now been a week since anyone has seen or heard from Kareem Khan. The Pakistani Government must immediately tell us where he is and why they have tried to silence such an important anti-drones voice. Failure to do so raises disturbing questions of continued PK complicity in the US drone program.”

Shahzad Akbar, Khan’s lawyer who has been fighting to stop drone strikes in Pakistan’s courts, reacted, “This is a completely illegal disappearance, which means some kind of pressure is being applied through his disappearance to the other drone victims.”

Akbar was at a hearing in the Rawalpindi Bench of the Lahore High Court to convince the court to help him figure out where Khan is being held. It is believed the intelligence services must have Khan because the police claim to know nothing about his abduction. The Ministry of Interior now has a week to find Khan and bring him before the court.

On “Democracy Now!,” documentary filmmaker and journalist Madiha Tahir, who interviewed Khan for her film, “Wounds of Waziristan,” said:

Karim is the first, that I know of, that has been picked up who is an anti-drone activist, but disappearances in Pakistan are very common. It’s a common state tactic. It has been happening in Balochistan, where there is a separatist movement, for a long time now. And, in fact, three are families protesting. There were mass graves found in Balochistan of missing people quite recently, only a few weeks ago. So this is a very common tactic by the state, and now, clearly, the Pakistani establishment, which is to say the intelligence agencies and the Pakistani army, want to send a message to the anti-drone movement to tell us to—you know, to tell the movement to shut up, basically.

A page on the “Wounds of Waziristan” website has been dedicated to Khan, with a call to people around the world to engage in a “Twitter Storm” with the hashtag #FreeKareem to hopefully get authorities to find him and have him freed.

Activists from the peace group, CODEPINK, are holding a demonstration outside the Pakistani embassy in Washington, DC, this afternoon.

A press release from the group reported, “Members of CODEPINK have met with Pakistani officials in the Washington, DC embassy and handed in over 6,500 petition signatures demanding Khan’s release. They have also been working with Congressional representatives from the Foreign Affairs Committees and met with State Dept Deputy Director Anne Patterson asking for her assistance.”

While it is unclear at the moment what role the United States might have played in Khan’s disappearance—or, more specifically, what role the CIA may have played, it should not go unmentioned that US intelligence agencies have sought to neutralize drone opponents.

Akbar was not granted a visa by the State Department to visit the US when he wanted to come and help translate testimony from Pakistani drone victims scheduled to testify to members of Congress.

When I interviewed Akbar at a “Drone Summit” organized by CODEPINK on April 28, 2012, he talked about how the US and especially the CIA became unhappy with him after he began his work in October 2010 because it bumped up against the narrative that the US was only killing “bad guys.” He found through work with victims that the US was mainly killing civilians and innocent people in Waziristan, who have nothing against the US. (He was representing Kareem Khan.)

“The US government has a long history of treating drone opponents as national security threats,” according to journalist Glenn Greenwald. ”In 2012, it denied a visa to filmmaker Muhammad Danish Qasim, a Pakistani student at Iqra University’s Media Science. He had released a short film entitled The Other Side, a 20-minute narrative that ‘revolves around the idea of assessing social, psychological and economical effects of drones on the people in tribal areas of Pakistan.’ The film highlighted the pain and havoc wreaked on surviving children and other relatives of drone victims. The visa denial meant he was barred from receiving the Audience Award for Best International Film at the 2012 National Film Festival For Talented Youth, held annually in Seattle, Washington.”

Drone opponents are viewed as individuals participating in a “propaganda” campaign against the US. Their success in turning people against drones is seen as detrimental to the ability of the US to wage the so-called war on terrorism effectively.

There is no evidence at the moment that suggests the US or, specifically, the CIA kidnapped Khan. But let’s admit the record of the US does not allay suspicion.

It is certainly reasonable to suspect that the US government has some idea where Khan happens to be and, if they cared about his abduction, the government could apply pressure to have him freed. But, since he is probably viewed as a threat to continued operations in Pakistan—operations which the Pakistan government has at least publicly displayed clear opposition and a court has even decided constitute war crimes—what can Khan’s family reasonably expect the US government to do for them?

'....ZAKARIA: Do you think we should be thinking of al Qaeda as a terrorist group? I know that there was a conference in January 2001, which you attended, at which you felt that bin Laden was better described as a religious warrior, and should not actually be thought of as a terrorist.

GUL: No. We said, unless the evidence is brought up against him, then he is not a terrorist. It's wrong. 9/11's full evidence has still not emerged. It is still shrouded in mystery.

A lot of people have a lot of misgivings about that. And it's not only me. I think a lot of people in America would be thinking the same way. There are scientists, there are scholars, who have written articles on it.

So, I think to dub a man as terrorist - because I know, I heard him twice say on radio, or something like that, and I think it was Osama - not only that, but Mullah Omar also said that he did not believe that Osama had carried out that act. So, that is still a mystery, and it needs to be resolved. Americans have still to set up a proper commission, an inquiry commission, into this event. I think that's very important. And I think President-designate Obama would do well to set up an inquiry commission into this.

ZAKARIA: What is your hunch as to who did - who perpetrated the 9/11 attacks?

GUL: Well, I have been on record, and I said it is the Zionists or (ph) the neocons. They have done it. It was an inside job.

And they wanted to go on the world conquerors. They were looking upon it as an opportunity window, when the Muslim world was lying prostrate. Russia was nowhere in sight. China was still not an economic giant that is has turned out to be.

And they thought that this was a good time to go and fill (ph) those strategic areas, which are still lying without any American presence. And, of course, to control the energy tap of the world.

Presently, it is the Middle East, and in future it is going to be Central Asia. So, there are many, many XX. And, of course ...

ZAKARIA: But you think ...

GUL: ... XX.

ZAKARIA: But you think who would be ...

GUL: That's what I also think, yes.

ZAKARIA: Who is at the heart of - who do you think was at the heart of plotting 9/11?

GUL: At the - it's very difficult, really. I wouldn't point my finger at it.

But I think it was planned in America. And at least one knows that it was done in Germany, as far as the reports go.

But I think the heart of planning was inside America, because the job was done there. But not a single person so far has been captured, caught, interrogated inside America, even though this entire episode took place there.

ZAKARIA: But you've said that the people behind it were the Zionists, neocon conspiracy. Do you mean by that American Jews? Do you mean Israel?

GUL: No Israel. I will not - because Jews are also divided into - not all Jews are bad. Of course, there are a lot of things common between Jews and Muslims.

In fact, they are the closest to us religion-wise, because some of their scriptures are respected by us. Their prophets are our prophets. They have the injunctions in Torah are very much similar to injunctions in the Holy Quran. So, there are things which are very common.

But there are those people who are very ambitious, who have a certain agenda of their own. And I think they have turned the world upside-down, because of those ambitions or their fears.

So, fear and ambitions are two things which have come together as far as Zionists are concerned. And they are trying to drive the policies of America. And unfortunately, the American people are suffering because of that.....'_________________'And he (the devil) said to him: To thee will I give all this power, and the glory of them; for to me they are delivered, and to whom I will, I give them'. Luke IV 5-7.

The operator told the Bureau of Investigative Journalism: "The UK has been asked for to pull back some from its availability bolster bundles on a brief start by the Pakistan government in perspective of security concerns."

The Government has wound up being powerfully tired of Western activities in the area following the to a unimaginable degree scrappy going of Osama Bin Laden, who as exhibited by Western governments had been stowing interminably in Abbottabad, Pakistan, perhaps with learning of Pakistan masters. NATO to use surveillance planes against Islamic State

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